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drabbles20in20 FIC: Themes Part Four: Author's Choice
Apr. 20th, 2011 09:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
matrixrefugeeThe Five Elements
One of Mal's signatures had been the unmistakable rich smell of earth. Even in the most sterile urban landscape, surrounded by glass and concrete towers, he smelled the dark, heady aroma of freshly turned ground, as if someone was puttering in a garden nearby. The scent was so distinctive that catching a whiff was enough to put Cobb's memories into a tailspin, if he happened to smell it in the waking world, and if he smelled it in a dream, it nearly made him panic.
Or at least it did until he noticed the very same scent lingered in Ariadne's designs.
Breathe, breathe, dammit. You might be dreaming, but that's still air you're breathing and you need it to keep your head clear, Dom. Don't start panting, don't start panicking. Not the time for this... keep trying numbers. There we go. Open the safe. Breathe. Take the plans, get out of here. Keep breathing, keep walking. Out the door, down the hall. Keep walking normally. Keep breathing. You're almost there.
Dammit, projections. Did they smell me down here? Shallow breaths now. Walk faster. Keep breathing. Hope they don't see you. Keep breathing, get out of their sight line. Find the damn exit.
The dream caught fire around him, but for once, Cobb wasn't responsible for it. He had smelled smoke as he was cracking open the wall safe where the subject had hidden the disk containing the program they were looking for, which compelled him to work faster. The rumble of the flames in the hallway threatened to drown out the chest-rumbling bass notes of the countdown. Cobb dashed into the hallway despite the flames chewing the walls.
He snapped awake, finding Eames kneeling over him.
"For God's sake, Eames, don't you ever hold your lighter under my ear to wake me up again!"
Of all the kick techniques his team could use to wake him up, Cobb most hated being dunked. Bad enough that it caused a flood to appear out of nowhere and crash over him wherever he stood-- in a conference room, a hotel room, a bar --even worse was snapping suddenly awake while underwater in a bathtub, and then having to fight toward the surface while he was already disoriented and at times shaking from injuries caused by the dream falling to rubble around him, burying him alive as he drowned.
It felt as traumatic as being born all over again.
Mal might, sadly or thankfully, have passed on, and now it was safe for him to build again without her shade interfering with his work or endangering his team. But her spirit lived on his designs. He saw flashes of her fondness for wood and natural designs in an interior he designed for an extraction which a hotel CEO hired him to run on an accountant suspected of embezzlement. He saw her cleverness in a maze he designed to keep the projections from finding the team quickly. And he felt the stability she once had, in the totem he carried.
One of Mal's signatures had been the unmistakable rich smell of earth. Even in the most sterile urban landscape, surrounded by glass and concrete towers, he smelled the dark, heady aroma of freshly turned ground, as if someone was puttering in a garden nearby. The scent was so distinctive that catching a whiff was enough to put Cobb's memories into a tailspin, if he happened to smell it in the waking world, and if he smelled it in a dream, it nearly made him panic.
Or at least it did until he noticed the very same scent lingered in Ariadne's designs.
Breathe, breathe, dammit. You might be dreaming, but that's still air you're breathing and you need it to keep your head clear, Dom. Don't start panting, don't start panicking. Not the time for this... keep trying numbers. There we go. Open the safe. Breathe. Take the plans, get out of here. Keep breathing, keep walking. Out the door, down the hall. Keep walking normally. Keep breathing. You're almost there.
Dammit, projections. Did they smell me down here? Shallow breaths now. Walk faster. Keep breathing. Hope they don't see you. Keep breathing, get out of their sight line. Find the damn exit.
The dream caught fire around him, but for once, Cobb wasn't responsible for it. He had smelled smoke as he was cracking open the wall safe where the subject had hidden the disk containing the program they were looking for, which compelled him to work faster. The rumble of the flames in the hallway threatened to drown out the chest-rumbling bass notes of the countdown. Cobb dashed into the hallway despite the flames chewing the walls.
He snapped awake, finding Eames kneeling over him.
"For God's sake, Eames, don't you ever hold your lighter under my ear to wake me up again!"
Of all the kick techniques his team could use to wake him up, Cobb most hated being dunked. Bad enough that it caused a flood to appear out of nowhere and crash over him wherever he stood-- in a conference room, a hotel room, a bar --even worse was snapping suddenly awake while underwater in a bathtub, and then having to fight toward the surface while he was already disoriented and at times shaking from injuries caused by the dream falling to rubble around him, burying him alive as he drowned.
It felt as traumatic as being born all over again.
Mal might, sadly or thankfully, have passed on, and now it was safe for him to build again without her shade interfering with his work or endangering his team. But her spirit lived on his designs. He saw flashes of her fondness for wood and natural designs in an interior he designed for an extraction which a hotel CEO hired him to run on an accountant suspected of embezzlement. He saw her cleverness in a maze he designed to keep the projections from finding the team quickly. And he felt the stability she once had, in the totem he carried.